The Icelandic polyhistor Jón Ólafsson is one of the most important representatives of Icelandic scientific history in the eighteenth century. Jón of Grunnavík (Grunnvíkingur) was born in 1705 in the Westfjords; after his father’s premature death in the smallpox epidemic of 1707, he was sent to be fostered to the lawman Páll Vídalín (1667–1727), who got him interested in literacy and books and subsidized his studies. Still very young, Jón moved to Copenhagen in 1726, where he attended university and became the secretary of the famous manuscript collector Árni Magnússon (1663–1730). On his behalf he copied several Old Norse manuscripts. He finished his studies in theology in 1731.
After Árni Magnússon’s death, Jón was commissioned to edit a catalog of the whole
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Citation: Bauer, Alessia. "Jón Ólafsson". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 13 August 2023 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=14987, accessed 13 October 2024.]